None.
Not applicable.
As a convenience to persons with young children, many commercial businesses provide equipment for seating the children and transporting them throughout the establishment. For example, grocery stores provide shopping carts having a child""s seat at the front of the cart. Public parks or zoos often provide strollers. Restaurants may provide highchairs to accommodate small children or toddlers. In each case, the carts, strollers, or highchairs usually are made available to the public in a central location. The equipment is selected, used, and then returned to the central location where it will be used again and again by other members of the public.
Generally, this type of equipment is not carefully washed between uses, and concerns have been raised about the sanitary conditions of the seats. For example, customers often return shopping carts to uncovered facilities in the grocery store""s parking lot after use. Persons without a child may place food items in the seat assembly. The result is that shopping carts may be tainted with dust, dirt, soil, fecal matter, and bacteria. Strollers, provided for indoor or outdoor use, are subject to these same contaminants. Seat assemblies exposed to food products may become contaminated with e. coli bacteria or salmonella. These bacteria and other contaminants are especially harmful to children whose immune systems are not fully developed.
A number of patents address the problem of sanitation for grocery cart seats. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,578,380 provides a thin sheet of pliable material that fits over the handle of a grocery cart, covers the seat portion, and is tied behind the back of the seat by means of a drawstring. U.S. Pat. No. 5,967,606 discloses a cushion that fits over a grocery cart like a shower cap. These covers may cover the entire seat area, but are designed to be used only with grocery carts.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,129,417 (commercially available at www.cleanshopper.com) includes a cross-shaped body, the vertical ends of which have pockets that slip over the back edge of the seat assembly and handle of a grocery cart. The sides of the cover body attach to the sides of the child""s seat. U.S. Pat. No. 5,678,888 discloses a cover having a rectangular-shaped section with a second section attached to it to form a cross-shaped body. With this design, snaps are provided to attach the cover about the cart handle and the sides and the rear of the child""s seat. U.S. Pat. No. 6,237,998 B1 discloses a cover having a front panel, an interior seat liner panel, and a rear flap. Extending from the interior panel are side rail cover flaps that cover the sides of the grocery cart seat. See also, U.S. Pat. No. 4,416,462; U.S. Pat. No. 4,805,937; U.S. Pat. No. 5,829,835; and U.S. Pat. No. Des. 342,835. Even though they are designed to address sanitary issues, cover designs having the noted cross or T-shape disadvantageously leave a portion on the child""s seat exposed.
Another problem associated with use of these types of seat assemblies is safety. A child often needs to be restrained in the child""s seat to prevent the child from leaning and falling out of the seat. The equipment provider may include a safety belt or other restraint as part of the equipment. However, a restraint often is not provided. If a protective liner is placed in the seat to protect the child from harmful contaminants, it must accommodate any provided restraint. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,129,417, which includes grommet openings for a belt to pass through to restrain a child. U.S. Pat. No. 5,678,888 discloses a shopping cart cover with a seat belt affixed to it. See also, U.S. Pat. No. 5,238,293; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,651,366. These devices disclose either openings to accommodate a belt provided with the seat assembly or a belt attached to the device to be used where a seat assembly belt is not provided.
Other patents are directed solely to the comfort of the seated child. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,666,207 which discloses a child""s shopping cart seat cushion. The cushion covers the front, bottom and back of the seat, leaving the sides of the cart seat uncovered. A design for another such device is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. Des. 289,123. The seat pad disclosed in the ""123 patent includes a first portion covering the seat and back parts of the child""s seat, the first portion being connected to a second portion, which wraps about the grocery cart handle. U.S. Pat. No. Des. 308,614 discloses a design for a protective seat cushion attachment for a shopping cart seat. The design includes padded portions attached to the rear and sides of the child""s seat of a grocery cart. See also U.S. Pat. No. Des. 380,118; U.S. Pat. No. Des. 393,172; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,655,502. These designs focus solely on comfort and other concerns, such as sanitation and safety, simply are not addressed. For example, to provide comfort to a seated child, a cushion need only cover the back and seat portions of the seat assembly. The sides are left exposed and, thus, as described above, pose a sanitation risk.
Although there are a number of covers, liners, and cushions addressed to child seat assemblies, these devices generally are specifically designed and intended to be used with a single piece of equipment, i.e., a cushion for a-grocery cart or a cover for a car seat. Improvements in seat covers continue to be sought in order to keep children safe, warm, comfortable, and clean in a variety of seat assemblies.
One aspect of the present invention is addressed to the combination of a seat assembly, a universal blanket, and a removable safety belt. The universal blanket is designed to be used with any seat assembly having a back portion, a seat, oppositely disposed side bars, and a horizontal front bar extending between the side bars and having at least one aperture below the front bar to accommodate the legs of a child. Devices with such a seat assembly may include grocery carts, highchairs, strollers, ordinary chairs with or without arms, etc. Being generally rectangular in shape, the blanket includes at least one leg opening which mates with the leg aperture of the seat assembly when the blanket is positioned in the seat assembly. The blanket is large enough to cover the parts of the seat assembly within the immediate adjacency of the seated child. The safety belt serves the dual purposes of securing the blanket to the back of the seat assembly and securing the child within the seat assembly.
Another aspect of the invention is a method for protecting a child seated in a seat assembly as described above. The method includes the steps of providing the universal blanket with the above-described feature. Then, the blanket is placed in the seat assembly such that the blanket""s leg opening is aligned with the leg aperture of the seat assembly and the blanket covers the areas of the seat assembly that will be adjacent the seated child. Next, a removable safety belt is provided. Finally, the safety belt is threaded through a restraint opening in the blanket so that it can be secured either in front of or behind a seated child.
Advantages of the present invention include a blanket that function as a blanket. Another advantage is a blanket that also can function to cover a variety of seating devices to provide comfort and safety/protection for a child seated in the seating device. A further advantage is that the inventive blanket in a kit, which makes the blanket adaptable to be used on ordinary chairs (with or without arms) to provide a xe2x80x9chighchair-likexe2x80x9d seat for the child. These and other advantages will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art based on the disclosure set forth herein.